Intel (Corporate level) would like to gather some information regarding our use of the community and potential for future use in trainings.

Please let us know:

what you think of community so far (given that it is in its infancy stage—only four months old)

what potential you see in having an Intel Education Community.

What could we do with community that isn’t already being done elsewhere?

What features, activities etc., could we provide for them that would keep them coming back (full honesty needed of course in all replies).

You all are welcome to come back and participate in any other space within our community-for now, everyone has a common bond in that they are all trainers (or Intel Corporate Team).

Also, Intel would like to have some volunteers from our group to use community to redeliver their training to PTs as a pilot. Theresa Maves would meet with you personally and help you get set up and answer questions etc. I will send her a list of any volunteers and when you might schedule your PT training. Just let me know if you would like to volunteer.

what you think of community so far (given that it is in its infancy stage—only four months old)I feel like it is a great place to have online discussions. There were a few small technical issues that were encountered at first but that is to be expected.

what potential you see in having an Intel Education Community. This community has the potiental to connect participants with other teachers who have gone through the program allowing for collaboration between classrooms. I also feel that this community is helpful for master teachers who have questions or advise about the classes they are teaching.

What could we do with community that isn’t already being done elsewhere?We used this area during our class in place of a Wiki and I feel that was a good thing because it is easier to use.

What features, activities etc., could we provide for them that would keep them coming back (full honesty needed of course in all replies). I think this site could be used to connect teachers with others who want to participate in their unit plans. Post unit plans and allow teachers to ask for others to collaborate with. This kind of thing is already being done in a site called Collaborations Around the Planet, but it might be nice to have this kind of feature for those who are specifiecally going through the Intel classes.

what you think of community so far (given that it is in its infancy stage—only four months old)

Once you get past the bugs (logon issues, etc. the comunity is very well put together and very helpful. It is much easier than having to create a new blog or wiki and then having to train the particpants on how to use both the Intel site itself and another site to complete class communications.

What could we do with community that isn’t already being done elsewhere?

Maybe an instant chat feature where participants could communicate with instructors or students with teachers outside of the actual class?

What features, activities etc., could we provide for them that would keep them coming back (full honesty needed of course in all replies).

One central log on will be be a terrific feature when that is finally in place. It is very difficult to create and remember different credentials for every Intel resource. A central location for all wil lmake it much easier for teachers and students to use, even if they do not have access to every single area within it.

what you think of community so far (given that it is in its infancy stage—only four months old)

I thought that the community made the course somewhat easier then the Essentials to navigate and complete.

what potential you see in having an Intel Education Community.

I see the potential in having people collaborating with other groups that are going through the course in other parts of the country or world. If there were sister classes that could be paired up, then there could be set parts of the course where you can get feedback from people outside of your class so that you get a wider perspective. Sometimes small group collaboration can be too narrow and even stifling. The community could allow and facilitate this.

What could we do with community that isn’t already being done elsewhere?

What features, activities etc., could we provide for them that would keep them coming back (full honesty needed of course in all replies).

In this case (TwT), the tools could be more user friendly. By this I am specifically talking about two of the tools that are difficult to use. The seeing reason tool should allow you to use relationships other then increases and decreases. Sometimes students are forced to use wording to get around this limitation that not only make it extremely difficult for regular Ed students, but make it impossible for English Language Learners. I see this as a deal breaker for my desire to want to use this tool in my classroom and I expect a lot of push back from my participants on it. I am actually shocked that this tool is so clunky yet featured so prominently in the course.

The second is the showing evidence tool. I could see it being usable by High school students or perhaps middle school kids with a large amount of training, but it is not very user friendly. There really needs to be pop up explanations so that students can navigate through the process of justifying their answers and even countering them without having to take a class just on where to put what. Most web 2.0 tools are laid out in a way that students can explore through the process themselves. I really think that a good tool can be mastered by students because there is a built in process to guide them through without difficult and sometimes convoluded instructions that are found in a separate place as in this case.

This being said, I like the fact that these tools attempt to harness higher order thinking skills especially the ability to justify an argument or a point with evidence and then to prepare for couterarguments. If these two tools were changed ever so slightly to be more user friendly, I think that they would do just that.

what you think of community so far (given that it is in its infancy stage—only four months old.Good place for online discussions. It's sometimes difficult to navigate, with more than one place to set email notifications for example. We experienced a few technical issues and even today logging in I received "page not found" error but hit back on the browser and the page pulled up. Also the edit window is difficult when trying to copy and paste text.

what potential you see in having an Intel Education Community.I can see value in having a place where other Master Teachers can share ideas in how they are teaching the course as well as ask others questions.

What could we do with community that isn’t already being done elsewhere?I'd like to see more of the different ways people are using the three "Thinking Tools". Any and all ideas have value and I can learn something from themabout what I want to do and not do.

What features, activities etc., could we provide for them that would keep them coming back. Again I'd like to see many more examples of the different ways people are using the three "Thinking Tools".

If Sunshine Darby ever lets me teach this course in Dysart, I would love to use the community to redeliver this training.

Intel (Corporate level) would like to gather some information regarding our use of the community and potential for future use in trainings.

Please let us know:

what you think of community so far (given that it is in its infancy stage—only four months old)It's pretty nice. I know I've given lots of feedback directly to Bonnie. There are small issues where items didn't work or don't. For example, the quote previsous message doesn't work. But there's (almost) always a workaround.

what potential you see in having an Intel Education Community.It'll be nice to have a central community where our groups can not only interact with each other but with other past and current participant teachers.

What could we do with community that isn’t already being done elsewhere?Not sure at this point but I'll give this further consideration.

What features, activities etc., could we provide for them that would keep them coming back (full honesty needed of course in all replies).

You all are welcome to come back and participate in any other space within our community-for now, everyone has a common bond in that they are all trainers (or Intel Corporate Team).

Also, Intel would like to have some volunteers from our group to use community to redeliver their training to PTs as a pilot. Theresa Maves would meet with you personally and help you get set up and answer questions etc. I will send her a list of any volunteers and when you might schedule your PT training. Just let me know if you would like to volunteer.

I think that the discovery and the use of the Intel Education Community is the desired tool needed to support the High Stakes tests set by Louisiana in our curriculum. The classes that will implement this tool will show a tremendous increase in the responsive questions on our State Assessment Tests. This tool encourages the students and teachers to do a ranking of High Level Thinking Order at all times. I can see that this tool is the answer to how to get the students to submit their knowledge in a general area of being more in the correct ball park than in the wrong ball park. Upon the completion of a task, the students can leave that classroom without feeling useless to education or they can't learn.

I think what you are doing, is the best way to get the delivery of your program out to the future users of America. I strongly believe that this tool will keep the educators returning for more of any future additional programs set up by "Entel."

what you think of community so far (given that it is in its infancy stage—only four months old)

It is a nice place to develop professional links and meet experts. It is like a glossary where you search and find solution to what you need.

what potential you see in having an Intel Education Community.

What could we do with community that isn’t already being done elsewhere?

What features, activities etc., could we provide for them that would keep them coming back (full honesty needed of course in all replies).

The search mechanism should be very well developed. Within few minutes one should be able to find what he/she is looking for. For instance after my Asia Summit from 16th to 18th June 09 I would like to know how many people joined the community after 16th June and should get the list of people joining after 16th or people joining from Asia. Is it possible at present if yes pl let me know if not pl do it.

If I m away for a while, when i come back I should be able to know what happened between certain time frame to follow up. This would increase the validity and people would keep coming back

This should become the platform a junction for all Intel Teach trainings GS, TWT, TEO, Essentials etc